Swappa and PayPal for Marketplaces

Starting today, we’re introducing PayPal for Marketplaces. While this will start as a limited, optional rollout for listings in our newer Marketplace 2.0 categories (i.e. laptops, video games, home tech, wearables), soon PayPal for Marketplaces will help streamline buying and selling for all Swappa transactions.

One of the bigger changes for this transition is in the authentication process for your PayPal account and linking it to Swappa. To start this one-time process, simply visit your PayPal settings page and click the “Login with PayPal” button. From there, PayPal will walk you through the steps to authenticate your PayPal account and link it with Swappa.

During this authentication process PayPal will present you with a few permissions that we want you to understand, so they don’t sound scary. Please note this permission set is standard to sites that will make use of PayPal for Marketplaces; here’s a quick explanation of how they’re used on our end:

“Automatically deduct their fee from each PayPal transaction…” – This replaces our standard sale fee collection, with the same net result. Instead of the fee being submitted as a separate payment by the buyer, the buyer actually pays this fee as part of the total payment at the time of purchase.

“Hold and release funds on my behalf…” – This permission isn’t something that we at Swappa will use at this point in time, but it’ part of the standard permissions required when authenticating your account with PayPal for Marketplaces.

“Use PayPal to process my customers’ payments.” – This permission is pretty self-explanatory, allowing payments on Swappa to be processed using PayPal, just as they have been before!

“Initiate steps to authorize and capture my customers’ payments.” – This is another permission that we will not be using at this time, and it’s simply included as part of the standard PayPal for Marketplaces authentication process.

“Initiate a refund for a specific transaction.” – Like some of the other permissions, we also will not be using this at this point in time!

“Search through and access corresponding transaction data.” – This simply allows us to view details regarding the payments between buyer and seller for Swappa marketplace transactions.

As mentioned before, these changes will start as a limited rollout but will eventually make it fully across the site. If you have any questions about any of the info mentioned here, feel free to reach out to us via email at [email protected], and we’ll be happy to offer further assistance there!